


Finality

by goodfaithyuki



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Gen, One Shot, Plot Twists, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 13:25:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19769128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodfaithyuki/pseuds/goodfaithyuki
Summary: [MAJOR V3 SPOILERS]The killing game may be over, but one final twist awaits its survivors.





	Finality

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this one-shot for a contest several months ago; however, I wasn't the proudest of it back then. Today, though, I decided to give it one last revision then post it on AO3. Hopefully it's not too shoddy. ^^;

“We should go, Shuichi.”

Maki breaks the silence after a few moments of contemplation, and I turn and see the slight smile on her otherwise solemn face. “Time waits for no one,” she continues. “Whatever is out there, we need to see it for ourselves.”

“Yeah!” Himiko cheers, pumping her fists in the air. “We got this far; why turn back now?”

I nod, a newfound curiosity filling my mind and heart. “Alright.”

Our first steps forward are slow and a bit clumsy, but after some seconds, we grow confident and break into sprints. The closer we get to the hole in the cage, the faster we run, until we reach it at last and come to a stop. I then look back at the destroyed academy one last time before saying goodbye for good.

At least, that’s what I meant to do initially.

Something catches my eye, and I whirl around again to make sure it’s just my imagination. Thing is…it’s not. When I realize that fact, I can’t help it: I scream.

_The area from which we came is beginning to disperse like pixels._

“Maki! Himiko! Are you seeing this?” I yell at them.

As I notice immediately afterward, they are.

“W…what…?” Himiko stammers, her assumedly panicked thoughts struggling to metamorphosize into coherent sentences. “What’s happening?”

Maki remains silent; however, I can sense her inner terror nonetheless.

I rapidly turn back around and prepare to jump through the gap…

…but the ground gives out from beneath my feet before I’m able to do so.

With that, we begin to fall.

I scream as we descend deeper and deeper into the void, the world above us getting farther and farther away. Without words, we all grow collectively aware of one thing: something isn’t right.

And then

we cease

to be.

For a brief period of time, anyway.

We hit the floor at a speed that should kill us, and the breath is knocked from our lungs. Strangely, however, we recover quickly; nothing hurts, and the only evidence of physical impact is Maki grunting in annoyance. I stand up and help Himiko to her feet, then I start taking a look around the area.

The world around us is stark white, save for some swirls of color that are splashed across the huelessness. It has no beginning, yet it also has no end; everything is the same. It takes me a moment to so much as figure out we’re standing on something solid, but even that tells me nothing.

“What is this place?” Maki asks with a hint of confusion in her voice.

“Y-yeah, where _are_ we?” Himiko squeaks, frightened.

“I don’t know” is all I can say in response.

“It’s nice to finally meet you, survivors – apologies for the rough landing.”

I spin in the direction of the fourth voice and am faced by a familiar figure – a boy with wild, brown hair; hazel eyes that shine with hope; and a stare that breaches my mind and looks directly into my soul. “Who are you?” I ask him immediately, ready to fight.

“I go by many names,” he answers somewhat cheerfully, “but for the sake of clarity, you may call me Admin.”

“Okay.” The flat acknowledgement comes from Maki, and I can tell she’s just as on-edge as I am.

Himiko angrily stomps a foot. “What’s going on, _Admin_?” She pronounces the entity’s name with an ample dose of sass, admittedly eliciting a small giggle from me.

Admin puts a hand over his chest. “You survived the fifty-third season of _Danganronpa_. Not only that, though – you ended the series for good. You avenged the lives of all who exist within this run of ronpa.exe, and we’re eternally grateful for that.”

“Yes, we know that m-” I begin.

Maki interrupts me. “What is ronpa.exe?”

The figure pauses before morphing, like a glitch, into another familiar person – another boy, this time with lighter brown hair and yellowish-green eyes. “Do you remember the Neo World Program?” he asks us.

We nod, still not understanding a thing.

“The program was based on something else – something we call ronpa.exe. The truth is, everything you’ve ever known at any point in time…it’s all a simulation based on a long-gone world: the real one.”

The words punch me in the chest like one of Kaito’s blows. “… _What?_ ”

“This is a fucking joke, right?” Maki hisses.

Another morph, and Admin is now a young girl. “It’s not,” she says. “As much as I wish it were, it’s truly not.”

Himiko is frozen in place. “But…but _why_ …?” she whispers.

“Please,” I beg, “explain what you mean…”

“As I said –” Admin blinks, though her expression remains stoic. “– the real world is gone. You learned about the Tragedy from the Flashback Lights, did you not? Well, it did occur…but in a different way than you were told.”

We quiet down and begin to listen to what she has to say.

“The original concept of the Tragedy came in during the first _Danganronpa_ season, and it continued to be canon until the end of Season 3, the final part of the Hope’s Peak Academy Saga. Decades passed, more sagas commenced and concluded, and the event’s canonicity was lost to time. That is, it was until Season 53.

“The flesh-and-blood Tsumugi Shirogane, as the scapegoat Mastermind, came up with the idea of reviving the Tragedy’s relevance fifty seasons after its initial end. She claimed to Team Danganronpa that it was for the sake of nostalgia, though her true motives were on par with, if not even worse than, those of the first Junko Enoshima. To put it simply, she was the true Ultimate Despair – humanity was but pawns in an apocalyptic game of manipulation and fiction. Not even a Flashback Light could take away her desire for power.

“When the final trial rolled around, the real fiction-world’s Shuichi Saihara and Himiko Yumeno failed to realize the full gravity and hidden meanings of the decisive vote, leading to their decision to choose Hope; the actual Maki Harukawa also sacrificed herself in its name. This was the beginning of the end – Maki’s punishment was mandatory participation in the next killing game; the surviving two students ‘escaped’ at the cost of their sanity; and K1-B0, overwhelmed with the audience’s grief and twisted aspirations, fell entirely under Tsumugi’s control.

“Actually, regarding Maki’s fate… Season 54 never aired. Heck, it never so much as got out of the development phase. Why? Tsumugi took advantage of K1-B0’s descent into madness and used him to develop something else originally present in the Hope’s Peak Academy storyline: a Despair Video. Similar to Junko’s own, it contained footage of a killing game, in this case the Killing School Semester, subtly edited to instill despair in all who watched it…and with ‘aid’ from the Ultimate Robot, she spread it throughout the viewers’ world.

“Despair was already at a peak due to the global decline of democracy, but the video – coupled with the hectic nature of _Danganronpa_ as a whole – caused its levels to go through the roof. Riots began to break out _en masse_ ; millions were slaughtered like helpless lambs; entire cities crumbled into dust…” Admin stops for a moment of silence, and I swear I can see sadness in her eyes.

“What was the aftermath?” Maki asks her, taking a step back.

Once again, Admin shifts, this time into an older girl with long, messy hair and a torn uniform. “Tsumugi s-succeeded. M-mankind ceased to li-live on. So many d-died, and th-those who survived had n-no way of seeking help and n-no chance for salvation. All they could do w-was lie d-dying in ho-holes, praying for a hope that n-never came.”

I turn my head and find Himiko silently crying, her face buried in her hands.

“But the story doesn’t end there,” Admin says confidently and without stammering, in stark contrast to her prior statements. “After Tsumugi’s death at the end of the world, a series of artificial intelligences used by Team Danganronpa gradually grew aware of the circumstances. While by then it was too late to save humanity, they devised a project to see if there was any way it could’ve been avoided, if they could bring a proper ending to the cycle of suffering. The final result: they merged together to create a single program – the simulated reality the aware few call ronpa.exe.” Admin bows her head. “I am the culmination of those intelligences.”

Maki’s hands are over her heart, Himiko is speechless, and I can barely speak. “I’m…”

“The program has been executed countless times by now; however, before this run, they all ended in oblivion.” As she says “oblivion,” Admin shuts her eyes. “But now…we can all be free at last.”

She then morphs one last time…into Kaede.

My mouth drops open.

“You need to trust me, Shuichi,” she tells me gently, raising her head and looking at me. “I've stood helplessly by as you and the others died time and time again... I’ve seen despair in its clearest, most abhorrent form… I’ve lived through the end of days, not knowing if I’d ever achieve clarity…

“This time, though, it’s different. Please make the most of this world. It may be the biggest lie of all, but that shouldn’t bar you from finding your own truths in it.”

It is then that I begin to break down in sobs. “Kaede…what am I…what are we supposed to do…?”

“It’s as you’ve said – some lies can lead the world to hope, and some truths can lead the world to despair. Forge your own paths, take your chances, and perhaps rediscover who you are in the process. There is no right or wrong answer to how you choose to live your life.”

The flow of my tears begins to lessen as Kaede’s words strike a chord within me. In that moment, I stop being aware that she’s just code taking on my friend’s countenance, and I look into her eyes and faintly smile. “I will.” Then I turn to Maki and Himiko, who – with some hesitation – nod as well. “We will.”

“Thank you,” she says, peacefully smiling and beginning to joyfully cry as well. “Thank you so much for keeping our promise.”

Pixel-like fragments of Admin scatter away and fade out of existence, replaced by a wooden door standing tall amid the white.

I step up to the door, and Maki and Himiko soon follow.

“What if the world doesn’t accept us?” Himiko asks, intimidated.

“We’ll make it, Himiko – I promise,” I tell her.

Maki slightly smiles once more at my reassurance.

“Are you ready?” I ask the two.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Maki replies.

“I-I suppose I am!” Himiko chimes in at the same time.

I grab the handle and slowly turn it. As I push, I notice light beginning to leak out of the gaps in the frame, and it fills me with a sense of determination I haven’t felt in a long time. _Whatever is out there, we will get through it all._

“Let’s go.”

And as the brightness fills our vision, we take our first steps into the world and beyond.


End file.
